Seminar & Advanced Class

Friday morning was an open mat. Cindy had just finished a private and asked to roll so that she wouldn't get stiff between the lesson and class. She took it very easy on me and we transitioned through a number of positions. Unfortunately I don't remember much about the roll, other than I hadn't warmed up yet but felt like I more or less still rolled ok.

Don't remember much about the open mat either. I was pretty bushed at the end, and later on in the day I felt like I'd been hit by a truck. Not sure how many rolls I had, probably close to 10.

Seminar in the evening was awesome. Wish more people had attended, but sad for them who didn't. Started off with a leg lace pass, where I got some good details like putting the shoulder on the side of the knee instead of the side of the thigh. Also the head down on the leg instead of on the hip as I am wont to do. After that it was sweeps and back-takes from the koala guard. Attacking someone who is back-stepping off of a knee slice seems downright awesome, but I'm going to have to drill it quite a bit b/c it does not come natural to me. Overall I was really pleased with the style and content. Many new takes and variations on themes that we rarely cover.

I had an unexpected private with Cindy while James taught the Fundies class. We started off with some passing, namely how to stay out of the danger zone of the legs and getting out of DLR if they establish a hook. From there it was some really cool details on maintaining top side control, then head snap-downs for both take-downs and passes. Also a crazy simple technique (squeeze their fingers together) if someone has back-control or if you're trying to get them react from a passing position (i.e. arm-drag). Much of it was conceptual, which is exactly the kindof stuff that I'm looking for right now.

Saturday noon class was open mat, which I only participated in the later rounds. I was a little tired from the private and enjoyed sitting next to James and watching other people bust their asses on the mats for awhile.

I used Sunday's advanced class to drill the leg lace and side control maintenance. Also drilled my DLR inversion thing a bit, the sasae (which quickly morphed into other takedowns) and grip breaking. A bit of bolo'ing too, since Sam was drilling X'ing the feet after inverting to maintain control of the legs. Worked very, very well.

I got pretty well manhandled during the rolls. Sol, Shaun, Kelly, Chaz, Sam and James. I nearly got to Sam's back (after he dominated most of the round) but reached for the upper body instead of securing the hips, which resulted in him escaping. I came close to James' back, but couldn't finish that either. He said that my leg hooks from half guard and scrambles are getting quite good, so there's that. I've been doing a lot of scorpion hooking and whatever else you call it to extend their legs and get to the back or a top position.